


President James Buchanan Memorial, Washington, DC

by nevermindirah



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Gen, Slice of Life, Up all night to get Bucky, hint of Sam/Natasha, local history
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-22
Updated: 2015-08-22
Packaged: 2018-04-16 13:53:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,149
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4627752
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nevermindirah/pseuds/nevermindirah
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Washington, DC is full of stunningly beautiful parks and monuments, so many that residents get used to sweeping beauty edging their periphery as they go about the hum-drum and exceptional of life. One of the lesser known monuments is the President James Buchanan memorial, tucked modestly away in one of the city's grandest and most popular parks. The memorial features a broad stone bench perfect for couples to canoodle, friends to play cards, lost souls to sit in quiet contemplation. In a city bursting with life and history, it's beyond easy to forget it's there.</p>
            </blockquote>





	President James Buchanan Memorial, Washington, DC

"You're a really good person to keep at this with me, Sam."

"Yeah yeah, free breakfast and nice words, trying to butter me up for round 42?"

Steve raised his hands as he stood, head bowed with a grin. "You got me."

"You might want to start upping your compliment game. Or I might start requiring hazard pay."

Sam handed Steve his plate with a sharp smile.

"Well how about we go do something fun today? Make it up to you for getting shot at in Wisconsin."

"Sure man, what did you have in mind?"

"No idea," Steve chuckled. As Steve took their dishes over to the kitchen sink, Sam caught the rustle of leaves outside the kitchen window. It was a beautiful Sunday morning and the Dupont Circle farmers market was starting to get busy down on the street below.

"You know what? I don't think you've spent enough time getting to know DC. How long have you lived here now?"

"Long enough to be on a first-name basis with all the bartenders at --"

"Bier Baron, yeah," Sam broke in. "One bar doesn't make you a local though."

"What would make me a local then?"

Sam stood up to pull his phone out of his pocket. "Get yourself all disguised up, we're going for a walk."

"Sure, sounds good. You gonna tell me where we're going?"

"Nah, find out when we get there. You'll need your Metro card and some grocery bags."

Then as Steve retreated to his bedroom, Sam called out, "Hey, can I borrow a shirt that isn't Under Armour? It'll probably actually fit me!"

* * *

They walked down from Steve's place past the White House to catch a bus across town. Metro would've been faster but Sam insisted the view would be worth it. Steve had seen his fill of the imperious buildings, but Sam wasn't wrong about the people watching. Tourists in matching t-shirts, hungover young professionals shuffling to brunch, protesters offering flyers outside the White House gates, young parents wrangling strollers onto public buses, homeless people with cardboard signs, and Steve was struck for about the thousandth time by how alike and different this city was from the Brooklyn he still missed. He'd always thought of Washington as Senator Brandt and postcards, much the way his new friends seemed to imagine 1930s Brooklyn imprinted in sepia. But the reality of every place is just people, milling around going about their lives.

Nearly an hour's walk and bus ride later, they made it to Eastern Market, where Steve drank in the sight of the old brick building at the end of long rows of vendors under tents. He and Sam went to work filling up their grocery bags with fresh fruit and vegetables from local farmers. Later, Sam took his time buying steaks while Steve had a long conversation with an artist at her stall.

Sam insisted they take the bus, then a second bus, to get up to his place in Petworth, where they dropped the steaks in Sam's fridge and prepped most of the produce for snacking. Before long they were back to walking, this time a stretch of a few miles down Georgia Avenue. Sam took the opportunity to tell Steve everything he could remember about DC history and his own memories of visiting his cousins here growing up.

Eventually they wound their way down past Howard University and over to Malcolm X Park. 

"You weren't kidding. This is gorgeous!"

"Damn right it is! Sunday's the best time to be here too. They oughta be starting to set up the drum circle, c'mon!"

* * *

Two hours later and Steve had managed to eat all the food they brought plus two bags of mango from the woman selling out of her cart a few blocks away. He'd also managed to get Sam to say four whole sentences about Natasha.

A gentleman never tells, was one of them.

"You seriously haven't had pupusas yet?" Sam asked as they walked down the steps by the massive tiered fountain.

"Seriously. Can we still be friends?" After a pause, Steve added, "Did I get the slang right?"

Sam chuckled. "Uh huh. Now we're gonna take a selfie and pretend I have an Instagram to post it to. We're both real cool," he said, bumping Steve's shoulder with his own.

"I'm pretty sure those girls," and Steve gestured to two teenagers in Howard hoodies at the bottom of the fountain, "would take a selfie for us if we asked them. How long do you think it would be before the whole Internet knew we're here?"

"Uh, I'm pretty sure I saw somebody take a picture of your ass earlier. Or maybe it was my face? Yeah, I think it was my face."

"You knucklehead."

"C'mon, we're The Falcon and Captain America, and one of us still sucks at disguises. Our neighbors are just too polite to make a ruckus."

Steve looked out to the park plaza below, the dozen or so of his, well, his contemporaries now, going about their lives. "You're right, it's good to get to know the neighbors a little better. So, pupusas?"

Sam talked his ear off about fluffy cornmeal and gooey cheese as they wound their way down the stairs and found a spot to sit on a ledge near the base of the park.

"I've gotta come back here with my sketchbook, you're gonna have to tear me away, it's like an itty bitty pathetic Central Park in here!"

"Hey! You know I've got love for Central Park too, man, you just gotta appreciate DC as its own place. You know New York is just in its own category."

But Steve wasn't looking at him anymore.

"Steve?"

"Well I'll be damned," Steve breathed. "They've got a memorial," he said, pointing, "to our least impressive president."

All of a sudden Steve was standing up, pacing slowly toward the marble benches lining one edge of the park.

"Bucky?"

"Hey Steve."

Just like that, there was James Buchanan Barnes, uncurling himself from the bench dedicated to his namesake, walking with a hint of swagger that Sam had not expected, tentative smile growing with every step. He scooped Steve up in a hug that reminded Sam at once of his sister and Riley and Natasha, and he could see in Steve's back muscles exactly what it meant to him.

"And you," Bucky said as he stepped back from Steve, "must be the guy with the wings. Bucky Barnes," walking steadily toward Sam, "pleased to meet you," right hand outstretched, "I hope."

Sam took a deep breath before stepping up to accept the handshake. "Sam Wilson."

"Did I overhear that our friend Steve has never tried a pupusa?"

The girls taking selfies over by the fountain craned their necks to look at the source of the aggressive peals of laughter coming from the bottom corner of the park.

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this story because Sam Wilson is important to me, and DC is important to me, and I was thinking about those things one day when I realized I was sitting 20 feet away from the President Buchanan memorial.
> 
> My research for this fic consisted of living in DC for a decade, then looking up a few things to double-check. Here's some background on the places Sam and Steve visit.
> 
> [Bier Baron](http://inlovewithbier.com/wordpress2/) is a dingy beer bar a few blocks from Steve's apartment that has over 600 beers from around the world. I imagine Steve coming here to get his moody on. The inside has a lot in common visually with the London bar from CATFA, if you feel the need to cry.
> 
> [Eastern Market](http://www.easternmarket-dc.org/) is a very old public market that features a big farmer's market, all kinds of local artists, and the kind of meat/cheese/seafood vendors that Steve would be familiar with from the pre-supermarket era. 10/10 would recommend for unusual foods and a delightful way to pass some time on a weekend.
> 
> It's my closely held headcanon that Sam Wilson bought a house in [Petworth](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Petworth,_Washington,_D.C.) after moving to DC following his separation from the Air Force. It's a quiet residential neighborhood that's gentrifying more slowly than other parts of DC, and it's convenient to the rest of the city (and especially a lot of great food) without the kind of nightlife hubbub I don't think Sam would be into following his service.
> 
> [Howard University](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Howard_University) is a prestigious [HBCU](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historically_black_colleges_and_universities) and the alma mater of Howling Commando Gabe Jones.
> 
> [Malcolm X Park](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meridian_Hill_Park) is a big, gorgeous, very popular park that's close to Howard University and about halfway between the White House and Sam's house in Petworth. It's still officially known as Meridian Hill Park; in 1969, Angela Davis called for it to be renamed in honor of Malcolm X, but the campaign to change the name officially was unsuccessful and residents just call it the new name anyway. The park has hosted a phenomenal weekly drum circle since the 1950s.
> 
> And finally, [pupusas](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pupusa) are Salvadoran cheese-filled tortillas. They are delicious and you must eat them if you're ever in DC, El Salvador, or somewhere other than DC that also has a big Salvadoran immigrant community.


End file.
